Ultimate Fighting Championship officials were in a giving mood Tuesday night, announcing updates to several events including a bantamweight fight between Ivan ‘The Pride of El Salvador’ Menjivar (23-8) and TUF 14′s John Albert (7-1) for the promotions debut event on FUEL TV.
Officials made the announcement via Twitter (@ufc) on Tuesday evening.
Fight announcement time…. UFC on @FUELTV – bantamweights Ivan Menjivar and John Albert (of TUF 14) will go to war in Omaha
UFC on FUEL TV 1 is expected to take place on February 15, 2012 at the CenturyLink Center in Omaha, Nebraska.
Menjivar will look to make it three in a row having earned a unanimous decision win over Nick Pace at UFC 133 and a fist round TKO finish over Charlie Valencia at UFC 129. The Salvadorian-Canadian made his bantamweight debut one year ago, losing a decision to Brad Pickett in Menjivar’s WEC debut at WEC 53. This is the second run for Menjivar with the UFC, having debuted against Matt Serra as a welterweight back in June 2004 at UFC 48. Serra would earn a unanimous decision in that match.
Albert was a member of Team Bisping on this past season of TUF, losing to John Dodson in the opening elimination round. He would go on to meet Dustin Pague at the TUF 14 Finale in Las Vegas, finishing the Team Mayhem fighter by first round TKO earlier this month. All seven of Albert’s wins have been by finishes and have never gone into the third round, earning four victories by (T)KO and three by submission.
Menjivar has impressed so far as a bantamweight fighter but will now meet a hungry fighter in Albert. If Albert can’t finish ‘The Pride of El Salvador’ in the first round, I don’t feel he’ll be able to pull off the W in this one.